I'm going to nose around in the pubs in this neighborhood for a bit, and then over to High Walls. I'm buying a lot of drinks that I'm not drinking. In High Walls, I'm quite willing to apply a little grease to get the wheels moving. In my experience, people with little are more willing to talk if you're willing to give incentive. I stay careful, though. It's quite probable that this is exactly how the Inquisitive got pinched.

"You guys are right," Trose says, "The lot of us makes a very imposing and confrontational sight. Let me hit the streets, grease a few throats and see what I can come up with. Finding things, and people are really just things that talk, is what I was born to do. I'll meet up with you for dinner at the Crown and Thorn. I'm in agreement that the sevretary should be a priority. You guys look for her while I try to find something on Norn or Heris?"

Sorry tp be so abrupt, but all this discussion happened after I logged off last night, and I'm only on for 10 minutes this morning.
05:18, Today: Trose rolled 20 using 1d20+6. Gather Information.

Trose mulls the clues over, turning them this way and that in his head, trying to make them fit into each other. Finally he says, "High Walls is in Lower Tavick's Landing. During the war, the authorities put foreign nationals there. After their nation died, there were a lot of Cyrans, and most of them are still there, being as how their nation is gone. It would make a good place for a Cyran who didn't want to be found to lay low. As for halflings, and kobolds and hobgoblin gangs," He throws his hands into the air, "I don't have a clue, really. I'm thinking that we might want to chek out High Walls, though. It would help if we know what Norn, or Marius looked like, but we can't have everything."

Trose looks around the room, with little hope of spotting anything useful - this type of investigation is not really his strong point.
He peers over Janosz's shoulder as he checks out the remains of the book, and takes a moment to write down all of the pertinent notes on a piece of paper of his own. You just never know how long such artifacts will be available for perusal.
After the initial search, he checks all the "less obvious" places to hide things. He carefully goes over the desks, paying attention to the inside, where the drawers would sit as well as the underside of the drawers.
He then checks the floor for loose boards, and the walls for loose molding.
He assumes that if the room was tossed by professionals, then there won't be anything to find, but if they were amateurs, he might get lucky.

AAAAHHH!
What the heck?
I check the game before bed last night... nothing much.
I come home from work today and 34087896923 posts.
Let's not wait on the rogue, guys....
I'm cross. I'll make my rolls and post later.

"Right then," says Trose, "A quick bit of shopping, and then off to check on this inquisitive fellow?"

Trose is going to hang on to his voucher until his pocketbook is a bit more full. I'll pick up 2 CLW potions at regular price (100 gp total), and save the rest. I also give everyone 5 gp.

"Didn't want you to think I was keeping what wasn't mine," he comments, while handing out small pouches, "Here's the rest of your shares from last night."
While the group is shopping, he gets a thoughtful look on his face, and comments, "You know, perhaps introductions are in order. It might be good to know who we're travelling with, and what we're capable of, besides mayhem."

I love playing paladins, and have never had to courage to play one in Ebberon. The setting seems too morally ambiguous.
Still, to help with the justification, I think we can look at this as at least partly a rescue mission. Bad guys are obviously involved, and she hasn't asked us to do anything illegal or immoral.
Could we use illegal and immoral tactics to get this job done? yep.
Do we have to? nope.
You get to be the moral compass of the group. Better you than me. lol
Just my take, and it's really up to you how you play and to Aubrey how he DMs paladins.

Trose idly tosses the bag in his hand, weighing, not its contents, but the offer on the table. He hadn't planned to get embroiled in his own House's intrigues, let alone the intrigues of some other House, but this particular "quest" sounded interesting... at least interesting enough to hear the rest of it.
Never once looking around at the rest of this rag-tag band, he says, simply, "I'm in."

Trose looks at Janosz, obviously makes an effort to clear his head and says, "Nah. I'll come back with you. Just let me stick my head in to tell everyone I'm gone, and that I'm heading over to meet the d'Cannith woman in the morning."
He opens the door, catching the attention of the warforged.
"Lightbringer... I'm heading home with Janosz. We'll be heading over to the d'Cannith compound after breakfast tomorrow, about the ninth hour. Could you let anyone who wants in know?"
After a nod presumed from the warforged, he heads back out into the rain and dark and rejoins Janosz.
"Let's go."

Sorry about the slow response time.

While at the House, I'm going to get the remaining 3 platinum broken into gold for ease of division.

Meh... then I give everyone 2 apiece, and hang on to the rest for now. Math... feh... I didn't include myself in the party size.
As for what I'm doing outside, just having a think. Not to worry, I'll probably wander back in out of the rain after I cool down a bit.

Trose waits until the priest leaves the room before turning to Ezreal and saying quietly, "Ezreal, maybe things are different where you're from, but here, when you're a guest in someone's home, (and no matter what else he is, this is that man's home,) you should show a little more respect. I don't know how it is in your homeland, but my experience with Flame priests is that they're not really in it as a business venture."
He stops for a moment to get his thoughts in order then continues, "I don't know a lot about you, and I don't know if you're planning on taking the d'Cannith woman up on her offer of potential employment, but I am, and if you are, you need to rein in the attitude a bit. Otherwise," he stops and counts out three galifars, "Here you go. Good luck."
He pauses a moment, solemnly passes three coins to each of the others, and slips quietly back out the door.
Once outside, he pulls the hood of his cloak up, hunkers down somewhere near the shrine entrance, and tries to relax.
Running his speech back in his mind, he can hear his grandmother talking through him. It was a little eerie.
I'm hoping I did the math right. I think the split was 3 each.

Just a heads-up guys. My computer is crapping out, and won't connect to the internet currently. (I'm posting this from the public library.)
I'm scrambling to get back online, but I may be MIA for a few days.
Please feel free to NPC me as necessary until I get this problem figured out.

Listen = 6, Knowledge(local) =21
Trose looks at the halfling, "Can you handle this much hurt? Otherwise, I can probably find a healer that works "behind the corn shed." since "under the radar" is a little modern another Knowledge(local)check to see if I can back that statement up = 17
"let's go."
I'm assuming that we're all moving at this point. We've likely used up any in-bar conversation time.

Trose chuckles, "Lady, I think it's safe to say that anyone who doesn't come herer for the ale is looking for work. So, yeah, I'm looking, Froglegs is looking, my guess is Ezreal is looking, and I'm sure the elf is looking."
He glances at the warforged, "You, I don't know about. You sure held your own in that fight, though."
He looks back to the lady, "How many are you looking for? If our recent adventure is any indicator, you probably need us all. You're right, though, we need to not be here."
He starts ushering folks out the door.

"Blast," growls Trose, "that'll make things stickier."
He looks at the woman, "You need any help? Looks like the mastermind behind this little kidnapping plot got away."
He glances around at the carnage, whistling softly, "Well, then. I expected things to go worse than that. You guys have got serious skills."
He checks his companions, noting that Ezreal looks badly hurt.
"Is that all yours?" he asks, pointing at the blood covering Ezreal, and going over to check him more closely when he sees how pale Ez has gotten.
Rolled a 9 on my heal check
"This looks bad," he says after poking at the wound a bit, and noting that the cut is deep enough to make a big flap of skin. "We'd better get you to a healer."
He grabs a relatively clean bar towel, shoves it against the wound and says, "Can you hold that there and walk, or do we need to rig a stretcher?"
He notes that the elf looks wounded, as well and says, "Good fight. You want to come with us to the healer?"
I know the warforged is wounded too, but Trose wouldn't know a wounded warforged from a steaming teakettle."

Trose moves to flank the last gnoll, considering the possibility of capturing it. Not knowing about half of the people on his side of the fight, he decides that ending the conflict peacefully is unlikely, and slips his blade below the creature's rib cage and up, into its vitals. 16 to hit, and 8 damage

Trose moves to flank the gnoll that Frogshanks just stabbed, slipping his short sword into an unprotected space just below the creature's armpit. hit roll of 21 (16 +3 for str +2 for flanking) for 9 points total (2 +3 for str +4 sneak attack) If possible I move so as to be threatening (and threatened by) 2 gnolls.
He looks around to see if there's anyone left who might be willing to help, and spotting the warforged (with the symbol of the Flame emblazoned on it's chest!) heading toward the fight, yells, "Get the human that fled to the kitchen! We'll handle his goons!"

Knowledge(local) roll = 17
My short-term plans are to rescue the maiden. I'll move toward the door in an attempt to keep them from just walking out with her

"This could get ugly, boys," Trose says to Frogshanks and Ezreal, "Gnolls are tough, but the bad ones are notorious for eating employees and victims, alike. Grandmother always said 'Only work for the villians when you have the upper hand, and if that's the case, why aren't they working for you."
He stands up and draws his shortsword.

How often is it okay to post, and how much time should I allow the rest of the players to respond to the situation before I post in and possibly make their logical responses irrelevent?
I'm new to PbP, and my cycle time is really high right now (I'm currently housebound, so I'm checking the boards about 10 times a day.)
I don't want to step on anyone's toes.

Watching the elf get shot down, Trose comments to his companions, "She might be it, but after that show, I don't think pimping ourselves is the way toget her attention. Let's just wait a bit."
He looks around the room, shivering slightly as the heairs on the back of his neck start to stand up.
"Be ready for... something. Trouble, maybe. I've got a feeling things here are coming to a head."

"Well," Trose comments to his companion and nodding slightly toward the woman, "there's a distinct possibility. She looks less like she belongs here than we do."
His attention drawn back to the door as someone else enters, he chuckles. "Yet another member of the family... interesting."
He nods to Ezreal and slides a chair out from the table with a foot.

Assuming that Frogshanks and I are actually at the bar together. (I would guess we know each other from the House, even though I'm currently wandering loose.)

Trose sat at his table, scanning the bar. His contacts had been clear - there was work to be had here, but Trose had his doubts, and had come in looking "nondescript" - plain gray cloak, plain, functional armor, blades prominent but not threateningly so.
He sipped his ale, his nose wrinkling at the flavor of the "secret ingredient" that gave it that bitter taste that the goblins all seemed to love.
"Should have ordered the wine," he muttered to Frogshanks.
His eyes continued to slide across the room, and his mental list continued to grow. It was a game his grandmother had made him learn, and he'd been pretty good at it as a kid. She used to take him places and give him a particular "type" to look for - sellswords, spellcasters, buyers, patrons - that kind of thing. It was years before he'd realized she was seeding the places with that type, as well as red herrings so that he had to work. He hadn't played in years, but it was coming back to him, and now he understood why she'd done it.
"Goblin merchants... no joy there unless we want to work a mushroom caravan."
"Three guys in the back... a possibility, but it looks like one of them is holding a dagger under the table, so probably not."
"Elf at the bar... he's playing the same game I am. Looks good in a fight, though."
Nobody looked particularly like a patron, or even a fixer. Still, it was early.
"Looks kind of slim" he muttered to his companion, "but maybe the pickings will improve with a little time."

I'm good with that, although I'm trying to "live down" the whole corporate drone thing. That's why I ran away from home.

"Who knew that the Houses would be so intertwined in everyday life in Sharn? They're freaking everywhere - my House as much as any other. We really need to get out of here and find some ancient ruin to crawl around in for a while."

Background:
Everyone in the family seemed to have something they wanted me to do. Take over the business, ID this item, find a good mate, you name it.
I want to see the world. So I'm going to.
Grandmother says she spent some time away from the family, and now she's a force to be reckoned with. She also says she'll keep me from being hunted down or excoriated.
Once I've seen Xendrik, and maybe Sarlona, and found something worth bringing back, I'll be ready to take over the business, and ID items, and find a good mate.
Just not yet.

I have everything published before Sarlona (I think).
I've got a pretty good handle on the setting.
I'm thinking about playing an artificer, but I'm no further along than that.
I'll try to knock something together today.